It was like a slap in the face when the catholic Luther researcher, Erwin Iserloh, asserted in 1961 that the nailing of the theses to the door of the Castle Church belonged to the realm of legends.The facts are convincing, the first written account of the event comes from Philipp Melanchthon who could not have been an eye-witness to the event since he was not called to Wittenberg University as a professor until 1518. Also, this account appeared for the first time after Luther's death and he never commented on 'nailing anything up' in 1517.

Needless to say, much scholarly ink has been spilled on this issue. What seems more likely is that Luther initially sent the theses privately to his ecclesiastial superiors, then (unwisely) started circulating them without waiting for a response.